Strengthening work requirements? Forecasting impacts of reforming cash assistance rules

Josep M. Nadal‐Fernandez, Gabrielle Pepin and Kane Schrader

Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 2025, vol. 44, issue 2, 663-673

Abstract: Work requirements are perhaps the most controversial aspect of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, America's sole federal cash assistance program for low‐income families with children. In 2025, for the first time in nearly 20 years, the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (FRA) will implement policy changes intended to strengthen states’ work requirements. However, researchers’ and policymakers’ understanding of how FRA will impact states’ compliance with federal requirements is hampered by a lack of research and publicly available data. We tie information from reports submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that we collected to administrative caseload and expenditure data to document several strategies that states currently use to comply with federal work requirements. We estimate that FRA will increase the stringency of work requirements in 23 states and that five states will begin to fall short of requirements. We note that several compliance strategies available to these states do not encourage work. We discuss changes to states’ work requirements that would promote better long‐term economic and labor market outcomes for TANF recipients.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1002/pam.22668

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:jpamgt:v:44:y:2025:i:2:p:663-673

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Policy Analysis and Management from John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().